Fast forward to my Gram's birthday, June 22nd. Still no job. I had, probably, fifty dollars left from the money that would last me "months". I also still hadn't touched the money from unemployment. But, rent was due soon and the old ladies always went to dinner and the casino for birthdays. I was hoping to hit it big as the casino. I took 400 out of the unemployment money. One hundred was for that day and the other 300 was supposed to go to rent.
After dinner and the casino, I ended up spending 150, so I was short on my already short rent. And, probably needless to say, I didn't win a dime at the casino.
On July 6th I managed to pay my rent by taking even more money out of the unemployment fund. Luckily, I was no longer paying for my alcohol addiction. My best friend, who was now speaking to me, and my guy friend-turned boyfriend were taking care of that for me. All I had left to pay for were my food and movie addictions. Easy enough, I stopped eating every day of the week and I also stopped renting new releases. Dollar movies and big lunches were all I had left.
After I paid rent I had, quite literally 187.39 to my name. No bills were paid in July, except my rent and half of my already overdue electric bill. The gas bill was so little, I figured I could hold it off for a bit. They also hadn't started to send me notices yet. The water bill, luckily, kind of, only has to be paid once every three months here and I figured I wasn't going to get it for another month. Well, as I was slowly figuring out, things I "figured" were almost always wrong. And I hoped what I was figuring out was wrong, too. The water bill didn't get paid that month either.
I swear, if the electric company took all the money that they put into envelopes and paper and printer ink and postage to send me overdue/shutoff notices, they'd have paid most of my bill for me.
Not four days later, July 1oth, my toilet decided it didn't want to work anymore. It was going to just leak water all over and not flush properly. So, not only did (do) I not have a kitchen sink (that broke in the winter) and a permanently plugged bathroom sink (someone, most likely me, dropped a plastic lid down the drain), but now I no longer had a working toilet. My problems never seemed to slow down.
But, as I try to do, even now, I looked on the bright side of things. My landlord had a plumber come out a few days before, and he would surely fix this problem when he came out to finish repairing my kitchen sink. Remember what I said about my figuring always being wrong?
By the end of July I had torn apart the apartment and gathered every last nickel, dime, penny, and quarter I had. Rolled and spent that on my ever-loving movie and food addictions. I was now down to eating every other day and renting kids movies (always free!) and fifty cent rentals. When August came, I didn't have any money to pay rent. Everyone I talked to about the issues in my apartment told me that I shouldn't be paying rent anyway, at least until I get my toilet and sinks fixed.
So, I listened to them for once.
My rent is due by the fifth of the month. I expected angry texts and emails and calls from my landlord on the sixth. That passed, nothing. The seventh passed, nothing. The eighth and so on. Nothing. By the tenth I figured that he knew why I wasn't paying rent and that he might do something about it.
There's me figuring again. I should learn to stop doing that.
I'll finish the story tomorrow. There's good news in that one, kind of.
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